Government culls chickens after bird flu spread
Government culls chickens after bird flu spread
Nani Afrida, The Jakarta Post/Banda Aceh
The Banda Aceh government has culled 109 chickens and ducks
believed to be infected with bird flu, a senior government
official says.
Banda Aceh Husbandry Office head Syamsuddin Ali said the birds
were slaughtered on Friday after a laboratory test
showed several chickens in Lamdom had bird flu.
Poultry farmers were initially resistant to the cull but
agreed to their birds being destroyed after government officials
stressed the gravity of the situation, he said.
The carcasses of the birds were put in a large hole and
burned, he said.
Besides the cull, the husbandry office is also planning to
spray disinfectant at poultry farms in Lamdom.
Lamdom is a subdistrict near the border of the provincial
capital of Banda Aceh and Aceh Besar regency.
The subdistrict has become the center of media attention since
the sudden deaths of hundreds of chicken in the area a few weeks
ago. Samples from the chicken were sent to a veterinary
laboratory in Medan, which reported a few days ago the birds had
contracted the virus.
Fifty of the 270 families in the subdistrict raise chickens,
with some owning large chicken farms.
The local administration is planning to compensate farmers
whose chicken were culled with Rp 12,500 (US$1.25) per chicken.
"Despite the outbreak, we are calling on people to stay calm,"
said administration secretary Thantawi Yahya.
As the bird flu story hit newsstands on Friday, chicken sales
dropped by 50 percent in the North Aceh capital of Lhokseumawe.
"We expect the government to announce Lhokseumawe is free from
bird flu virus," said a chicken trader, Yus.
Earlier, a senior central government official claimed the bird
flu virus spread into Banda Aceh when relief workers
inadvertently took sick birds there.
The bird flu cases in the tsunami-ravaged area have
increased the hardships of the people, but the government said it
would do its best to contain the outbreak.
Aceh's coastal areas, including Banda Aceh, were destroyed by
the Dec. 26 tsunami, which killed some 130,000 people in Aceh and
left 500,000 others homeless.
Bird flu has killed seven people nationwide.